La La Lie
by Madeline Cullen
Summary: Iggy is confronted with a new person. Someone who has the potential to make everything in his life right again. But will her clone help? Or create a bigger mess? Iggy's coming back to his girl by July. No matter what Tally II wants. Hiatus
1. Violet! At Your Service!

When someone feels like they've made the single worst decision of their life it, quite plainly, sucks. So when I turn around and look at the mirror, I see….some horrible being broken out of a huge containment cell.

The wet smack hitting the floor would be me, and the huge ass pain I get from behind me and behind my eyes would be landing backwards onto the gosh darn hard tile. Horrible pain.

_Ok. I have to open my eyes,_ so I do.

But I do try, it's the single most stupid decision I have ever made. And it just so happens to be my first non-scientists provoked decision. (Of those include "It's either I run or get my feet done extra crispy—okay. I run like hell!" And the ever popular, "I kill my opponent, use my power—or get killed. Sorry but it's battle of the fittest here.)

So I try again.

With tiny little baby flutters of my eyes lashes until I can see straight. And prevent the searing.

I roll onto my hands, pushing myself up with my arms and stretching my wings, the goop in the feathers slopping onto the floor. When they're completely spread, I shake them much like a dog.

And that's when I notice all the people around me gaping.

I'm seriously annoyed by now of all these gaping idiots. Though since I haven't been shocked or shoved onto a crate, I figure that they're not completely evil—but if they're trying to be nice, they could have tried to soften my fall onto the damn solid ground.

When I finally see they're just standing there, still gaping after a good thirty seconds of silence, I snap.

"You all keep staring at me like that and you'll look like fish for the rest of your lives," I say darkly.

But one of these guys—technically a tan-ish looking chick—looks at me (again) and gasps out, "Tally?"

I frown, "Tally two. But what's it to ya?"

And just because I mention that, I'm whisked away. Like lightning, I whip out of the lady's hands and back up against a wall, arching my wings above me to seem bigger, crouching and baring my teeth. Hell, it was worth a shot, the scientists sure as hell hated it when I did it.

"First of all," I started after everyone in the room stopped moving. Couldn't risk apprehended. Who knows how they could have messed with my little environment. "Who the hell are you people? And why are you breaking me out of my place?"

* * *

Iggy had bunched up his tie, throwing it on the ground. The tiny flutter

It was official. If there was anyone in the world who hated dead people, it would be him. He went to her funeral, he stood there and listened as they put her in the ground. Fully aware that the girl he was in love with was cold and going to be rotting. And probably still radiant. But she was dead. Gazzy had told him that her wings were wrapped around her. And she was wearing a blue dress that made her look like a real angel.

"God dammit!" he grunted, slamming his injured fist into the wall. "Why the hell did you die? Everything was finally okay!"

He had stayed over night, after he heard the people put dirt all over her coffin. And he only came in after he knew the flock would be gone from the house, trying to help look for any experiments. Two weeks.

Two weeks had passed since the horrible fight at the Facility, the dangerous escape they made with the help of a bouncy and self-sacrificing experiment named Cookie, and her technological genius of a boyfriend, Kaiden.

Two weeks had passed since he last saw her. Last heard her beautiful voice.

And in those two weeks, he had to fight tooth and nail with whitecoats to make sure that she got into the ground with all of her organs. He refused the removal of her organs. Jeb had found one of the special cells the whitecoats had used to store dead experiments in their morgues. Would completely preserve her. Prevent her from decomposing. Forever staying beautiful.

_But she wouldn't have cared, _he thought. _She never cared about how she looked. _

He gave a dry grin, tears stinging at his eyes, begging to crawl down his face. But no, he had cried enough. Tally would have been on him twenty-four seven trying to make him smile. Or hell, annoying him until he ended up chasing her around.

The sudden shrill ring of a phone somewhere in the safe house they were at sounded. Iggy gave a start, his hand crashing against the wall again; this time by accident. His pinky twisted in a way it was supposed to. The pain came in sharp and he put his digit in him mouth, muffling the string of cuss words leaving his lips. He made his way to the phone, not expecting at all the short, clipped sentences that were uttered to him.

"Her clone."

"Tally."

"You can be happy."

"Come right away."

He put down the phone slowly after listening to the dial tone.

"….her clone?"

* * *

What clues me in to the horrible torture that is me in a room filled to the brim with a ton of people who happened to have wings? The fact that they have wings out and are looking at each other and me like they're trying to figure out whether to have a burrito or a taco for breakfast, and realizing that they'll regret it majorly afterwards (horribly tortured hours in the bathroom) and are now wondering how the hell to deal with the ten orders of tacos _and_ burritos that they just ordered cause it they couldn't decide in the first place.

Instead of looking at these freaks, I look at the dog. Then my eyes drift away because I remember from files I've read that this dog can talk and is giving me a strangely similar look to the other freaks with wings.

Now, the freaks themselves I have memorized.

Max. Counter part Max Two was a horrible bee-yotch to me. And I would have been glad to make her brain dead if I was allowed. Or hell, settle for my fists if I had to. Thank god I couldn't find her or else she'd be dead for landing me in the fire escape survival training. Last I checked she was shipped off to Germany.

Fang. His counter part was…floating around. I don't know. I know his counter part was supposed to be my twin as well, but I couldn't give a rat's ass about him. He once stuck a tooth in me when I tried to talk to him about us being siblings. And then he calmly licked his shiny white teeth as if he didn't just bite into me like I was a blood packet and he was some winged vampire.

Nudge. Her counter part was eradicated a while ago. For being too soft—we all called her Softy. Sent to Germany for termination awhile ago.

Gazzy. I miss the kid he was pretty good. He stuck with me through it all; until they pitted me against him in an arena. It was hard to use my powers on him, but it was either me or him. And I always pick me—because who else will? I was (and am) just a mutant in this big place, might as well look after myself some. I liked to call him Baby Boy.

Angel. They got real frustrated with her model; was more interested in playing with teddies than she was in tearing up the Goblin they put her up against. But she was sure a sweetheart. I called her Baby Girl. Sent her to Germany as well.

And then my counterpart wasn't among them. But she was supposed to be mute and easily scared. Paranoid. Could freeze and stop time and pass on pictures- molecular manipulation.

Just as I was about to open my mouth to talk to these people and asked why in hell's name they decided I was so damn fascinating, a person burst in through the door. And I nearly had a heart attack.

"Gunner?" I gasped out almost silently at the same time he called out rather blindly, "Tally?"

I shook my head quickly, noticing that his eyes were clouded over. "You're not Gunner….you must be Iggy," I muttered slowly, trying to push any thought of my winged buddy away from my mind.

It was so depressing how quickly the energy flowed straight out of me and into the dang ground. Really, Gunner? Pssh, about as possible as trying to get a pig to fly. (They weighed far too much, and their cleaning tendencies made the feathers weight too much.)

Max stepped forward and claimed her distraught looking flock member. I watched silently, molding my face so it displayed no emotion, so I practically looked bored. She pulled him aside, his strawberry blonde hair shifting around in all the same places that Gunner's would.

"It's not Tally…okay? Tally is in the ground. This is her clone. Don't try anything, it got a bit violent when we let it out," she whispered. As if I was not right there, a few feet away.

"Excuse me, sweetheart, but I happen to be right here. And I am not an 'it.' I happen to be the _damn_ proud owner of a female reproductive system."

They all stared at me again.

Um, maybe I came on a bit strong. Stupid me. Need to learn to tune down the snarkiness.

"I know she's not Tally, Max," Iggy said, his voice was a bit clogged sounding. As if he had been crying recently; I heard that tenor often enough around the Facility. "But still."

"Yeah, what he said. Treat me like a human, will ya?" I said and then paused at the silence. "Okay, so maybe that's not all that accurate but still. I'd like to be treated with respect, thank you very much."

This seemed to put Max in a foul mood because she addressed me in a manner that I could only compare with her idiotic clone. "Just shut up. This has nothing to do with you."

"Yee-ouch. Kitty got claws. I couldn't give a dang if you think I'm involved or not. If you didn't notice, my original is dead, and this guy"—I point at Iggy here—"happens to be the only guy in here treating me well in the entire fifty seconds he's been in this room with you comatose people."

Max glared at me for a long while, and then she crosses her arms and sighs.

When she says nothing in response to what I said, I resist to stick my tongue out at her and say "Na na na na-na! I won!" because, of course, that is completely childish and I would never in my life do that….unless I _really_ felt like it.

"Are you Tally?" the blind boy asks me.

I look him straight in the eyes, feeling somewhat comforted by the fact that they aren't the funky green color that Gunner's were. "No. The scientists called me Talon II. But the others call me Violet. Obviously"—I point at my eyes—"because of this screw up of the scientists."

Iggy simply blinks at me, as if waiting for something.

I look around, my guard going up some more, before I realize why he is completely silent. After the dog mutters "Imbecile" under his breath.

And boy do I feel like the chick who picked roses and jewelry over a free meal. "Ah, my eyes are purple. Chemical imbalance or something. Just like you're Tally had gray eyes instead of brown," I say quickly, feeling heat all over my face.

"Ah," Iggy says, sort of robotically.

And the silence continues.

Just my _freaking_ luck, I got stuck with a band of mute mutants.


	2. Bring Me To Life

When they finally got the guts to start talking, they had me running all over what was left of my place. I had to dictate which hallways led where, tell them whether or not anything dangerous had to be killed, open up the screens (these little buttons were hidden all over the walls, you'd press them and a digital, holographic yet interactive screen would be projected right up in front of you and you'd just operate it like it was a drag and drop computer) and then let Nudge operate them.

Running up and down, finding out until later that they had only left the dangerous experiments for last. Which would explain why I was feeling like I could eat like a horse. No contact with anyone who fed us and being left to our selves for so long? Yeah, we'd start turning on each other and thinking we looked like those juicy hamburgers from the pamphlets that were handed out during Stage One of Preliminary Integration.

After that, we ran off to go stuff our faces and I discovered that hamburgers really did taste better! At least compared to IVs or the mish mash they'd slide at us if we were running the obstacle course.

And way after all the horrible work, we settled in at a hotel.

Which is where I found myself in something of a pickle, sadly enough; I was sleepy, restless and over thinking everything I saw.

See, those dummies with wings just sort of whisked me off my feet (more like, blankly ordered me to come with them, and for fear of these zombies eating my brains, I followed….or maybe I followed out of curiosity?) and now I was stuck in this hotel room really bored in the middle of the night. Much how I used to be when I was in the Facility.

Why wasn't I asleep like any other sane person on this side of the hemisphere?

Oh, well, it probably had something to do with the fact that the freaks were keeping watch of me. That Iggy boy just always stared at me with his creepy clouded over eyes, occasionally clenching his fists (and I'd just stared at the way the tendons and veins would stick out in exactly the same places as it would on Gunner) or his eyebrows coming together as if he was concentrating _reeeeally_ hard on not letting it out. (Something the Gasman should learn, sweet jeezums, that boy stank to high heaven, and this is coming from a girl who had to live in a containment cell with five dudes and no toilet or wash in sight.)

I had pulled the curtains apart, to let the moonlight through, bathing the room in a nice dark blue glow. It wasn't too lavish. Just a standard suite, two beds, one pull out, tiny kitchenette and stuff—just standard from what integration taught us. There was a highway in the distance, with tons of cars zooming by, the forest with tons of shadows and birds, closer to the hotel was a seven-eleven with a few kids puffing on some cigarettes and skating around some.

Right now, I was just looking at him straight in the eyes, knowing full well how my eyes had this freaky habit of glowing something as if it had a strip of fluorescence in the iris. (I blame the scientists. Honestly, they were just screw ups in general.) And I was wondering if he could feel that the very person he was staring at was staring right back but if this was a staring contest he would just straight out lose because I would blink all I want and totally not tell him.

"I can't hear your thoughts," he said quietly, brushing his lips with his index finger. Something I notice he did often.

"Your point? You'd probably implode from how much I ramble, Mr. Edward Cullen."

He gave me a très are-you-alright-in-the-head look, "Edward Cullen?"

I rolled my eyes. These people were obviously behind on the times. "It's a book. And a movie. Doesn't get much attention what with the whole of the world focused on winged kids and rebellions, but it's good."

"The whitecoats let you watch movies?" he asked incredulously, cocking his head to the side.

I coughed a laugh, "Are we on the same page here? Didn't we both grow up in an environment where tag was usually getting chased by some grotesque monster and you sure as hell didn't want to be tagged? No. They didn't. Just on occasion, when someone from the Manipulation Experiments came in, then we'd cajole them into convincing the interns to get us a movie. That, and we were in the preliminaries of integration."

By this time, I think the whole flock had just suddenly appeared, out of nowhere, and circled around us like a campfire. I twirled my long black hair out of habit.

"You talk and think as much as Tally did," Angel said, petting Total's fur. Iggy gave a wry smile, "Yeah. Jabbers on and on."

Just gave a shrug here, "I'm her clone. We're not completely the same, but things like wavelengths and body composition should be somewhat similar, yes. And you're just like my Baby Girl. But you seem older. She just sort of hid behind us before they shipped her off to Germany."

"But…not as much as me, right?" Nudge said quietly, holding an ice packet to her head.

"No. Not as much as you used to, Nudge," the dark haired one told her. Er, Fang, right. The evil biting dude's original.

"What's it like, being a clone?" the Gasman asked.

I flashed a smile, then winced, remembering what I had to do to this cute little boys' clone. "Baby Boy asked the same thing all the time. 'What's it like being an original?' Well, I guess you just feel…like an impostor with no name. We don't, by the way, have names that is. You people do, because you have a mother and a father, but we don't. Just copies."

"What did you do to Gazzy's clone?" Angel asked, staring at me with those huge blue eyes.

Forcing a smile now, "Rather not talk about that."

"I know we're hitting very sore subjects, but figuring out what we're going to do with you would come along a lot faster if you answered our questions. Okay?"

Did I really care?

No.

Not really.

Unless they had icky and disgusting questions about my non-existent personal life.

Angel nodded at Max, I guess giving her the go-ahead.

"What's the preliminary integration?"

Oh right. Just go straight for the most complicated questions. Thanks Max, thanks a lot.

I fill my cheeks with air and then blow it all out before I answer. "Well, it's one of the methods the scientists were developing to make it so the experiments didn't feel like they were all caged up. It was…to make us feel like we weren't missing out on anything, we had everything we could ever get in our lives within reach. This started a few years ago, after the clones, and Tally, were sent to the Facility. They would teach us how to read, how to talk, they would teach us the basics of English, and then they would give us approved literature.

"That was stage one. To make sure that we were educated—that way logical conclusions could be made. That way when it came time to decide whether or not to rebel against the scientists, we'd be fully informed of our standings and convince ourselves that we were in the best situation we would ever be. They provided us with some papers that had a zillion rights on it, Animal and Human ones, but it didn't really specify on any experiments. So most were led on to assume that we had no rights, and at least here, we weren't being treated too badly."

I placed my hands behind me on the windowsill, leaning against it as I looked outside at the nice clouds. "Stage two was going to be eliminating those who knew too much of the outside world. Also known as, Germany or Death Battles. If you knew too much about the outside world and how you really did have a chance, you'd be sent to Germany as baggage for the Facility's sister company, the School. Or, they'd pin you against those of us from the more dangerous side of the building. Section 8.

"And stage three would have been the transferring of the experiments to a dorm like, heavily guarded, Facility Head Quarters in Spain."

"How did they get all these other experiments killed, and not you? How did you survive?" Fang asked with searing precision, his dark eyes landing on mine without hesitation.

I stared him down in silence. "You learn to manipulate. As you get older in there, you learn to keep your mouth shut if someone asks a question. You learn to read that stupid intern who wanders down the hall, so scared he might pee himself, with a feral goblin at his side. You read there scared faces. You pick up on how the screw up on their questions, and you figure out which answer is the correct one. But the younger kids didn't understand this. They answered truthfully. 'Who is Maximum Ride?' Almost anyone who knew _your _clone"—I shoved a finger in Max's direction—"were put on probation."

"We found you in Section 8," Nudge said tentatively. "But you, like, don't seem all of that dangerous."

I ran a hand through my hair at this and gave her a sort of regretful smile. "No. I'm not too dangerous. I'm a failure actually; I'm physically weaker than Tally. My kicks wouldn't be able to cave anyone's rib cage in unless I am really pissed. No, they put me in Sector 8 because of my powers."

"You can freeze things, right?" Gazzy asked, starting to flash me a smile. "A big airplane and birds and erasers and then make them all explode right?"

And yet, this had me way confused. "Nah. Nothing so flashy as that"—_Or reckless,_ I thought to myself—"just something simple."

I smiled to myself. Nothing really that simple. But sure, they could believe it.

"What's your power?" Max asked firmly, having gotten up from her seat on the ground to look up at me. I nearly laughed in her face as I used my two inch advantage on her. Yet, I couldn't help but think she did give the impression of being a lion with the big brown eyes and frizzy-ish blonde hair.

"Rather not tell," I said smugly. "I'd sooner get my brain cut open by some quack job human who doesn't know the first thing about hybrid anatomy."

She didn't need to know anything that was dangerous about me. No. Every time I told someone about either of my powers it ended in disaster.

"It won't end in disaster," Angel said gently. "You can trust us. We all have powers as well."

My resolve weakened a bit at that innocent voice. "Yes. I'm know that very well, sweetie—I mean Angel. But Gunner said the same thing when I wouldn't tell him. And look where he ended up."

"Who's Gunner?" Total asked, finally speaking up. "You keep mentioning him and stuff but you never told us who he was."

Ah great.

Great Violet. You should've answered the damn question about your powers instead of working with this awkward question instead.

"Gunner was this blind one's"—I pointed at Iggy rather harshly—"clone. Save he had green eyes like my purple ones. All glow-y and stuff I mean. He had the power that matched mine while another chick, Cookie I think was her name, had a power to compliment my other one. Gunner stuck with me through all the tests and the screaming and the crying, whenever we had to kill another experiment in the Death Battles, we had each other. But I don't know where he is right now. They took him away from me almost as soon as Tally broke out."

After a nice pause where I swear a zillion gay babies were born, Max sent the rest of the younger kids to sleep. Leaving me, her, Fang and Iggy. Wonderful.

"Well, anything else you want to quiz me on, oh Apocalypse children?" I mumbled sarcastically. It seemed to me, even talking about Gunner made me feel awful physically.

"Yeah. Did you love him?" Iggy asked out of the blue.

I jumped, looking at him wide eyed. "The hell type of question is that?"

"A valid one," Max said coolly, Fang had his hand in hers, and Iggy seemed to be putting his hand out, as if some invisible person next to him were supposed to grab it.

Sad thing about the latter part, I could really imagine my original there, with her head leaning on his shoulder and a slight smile on her lips as she looked into my purple eyes with her gray ones.

"A personal one," I spit out. "The hell do you care if I loved this here boot!"—I held up the one they had given me to put on instead of my standard Facility Sector 8 scrubs—"It'd still be my damn personal life!"

"Yes. But Jeb would like to know. Iggy was with Tally. I'm with Max. He'd like to know if we pair off at a certain age."

Frowning, I crossed my arms over my chest. "Yes. I was. But he didn't know. Happy?"

"Yes," Max answered. "Now, what's your power?"

This time I sighed. They weren't going to let this one go, were they? Well, if they messed up, it was on them, not me. "Animation and psionic blast."

"What are they?" Fang asked blandly.

"Psionic blast is why I was in Sector 8. I can cause physical damage to the brain with just a thought. Like bullets. Animation means…I can bring things to life."


	3. Guess What? I'm Done

I just made myself busy the next day.

See, this always _always_ happened whenever I told anyone what my powers were. The part where I can turn anyone's brains to mush can scare them off but the part where I can bring people to life usually makes them gape.

See, mutants and freaks all usually have someone _dead_ who they want to _revive. _

My problem here is that I am a genetic screw up of the scientists.

Whenever they make a nice little clone like me, things go wrong. I'm plenty more weaker than the original Tally for one but still considerably stronger than a grown human man; my eyes have been messed with, but because of this they're better than most experiments eyes, so better than Tally in that way; I panic, straight out panic in fights unlike the original who had expertise in the art of running away; I'm OCD (which is pretty damn pathetic in the horrible living standards an experiment is faced with) and will start counting when things start going awry…and a ton of other things.

Gunner had similar problems…well, okay, not really. He was more of the Emmett Cullen of the mutant world. Honestly, swift, agile and strong (though only Max II ever really matched up to her original in physical strength) and powers just as deadly as mine.

I remember this one time, we were up in a survival arena. One of those things where its tons of different terrains with little snares and traps hidden here and there and a pack of Feral Goblins were searching through it all for us. They had given us nothing but a bottle of water, a match, and a brown shirt and black pants.

Of course, the first thing Gunner even mentioned was that we needed to find a more lasting source of water while looking at his flimsy bottle rather like he wanted to incinerate it with his eyes.

Naturally, I agreed, never really one for strategizing in dire situations. I was about to pull my wings out when he added as an after thought that the Goblins would be looking for the scruffy mutants in the sky.

Again, I nodded and we set off.

"Violet?" A voice called me out of my reminiscing. I had been going around the hotel room and organizing things; biggest to little, colors from dark to light and in chronological order if I could.

I turned to the source and flashed a smile at the one of the two friendly faces in this lonely hotel room.

"Hiya Ella, what can I do for ya this fine fine morning?" I asked with a horribly exaggerated southern drawl.

Well, at least she giggled.

"I was wondering if you could come shopping with me, you know? You can't use all of Tally's clothes forever." Not that there were much.

The flock had handed me her backpack since it was a perfect fit. And I put them on.

Not that any of it was really my style.

How does a mutant have style?

Try staying in a room, bored, while the scientists are evaluating your ability to adapt to society, with a zillion magazines everywhere and a TV. Yes, they were actually dumb enough to do that.

"Sure hun, with what money?"

"Oh, don't worry about that. We have a few government credit cards as a small part of what they owe us for this whole Apocalypse Children thing," she smiled. Ella still had plenty about her that screamed that she had been experimented on. Her hair was dark in some parts, white in others, her irises had a certain red to them that I really couldn't put my finger on and she looked pale. Sorta like a cross between a creature of the night and a human.

Which I suppose, thanks to my lovely fellows at the Facility, she now was.

"That'd be really nice!"

* * *

"My girlfriend's clone is walking around this place_,_"Iggy thought blankly, he was lying down on the powder blue comforter in the hotel, throwing a red rubber ball against the ceiling. "While my girlfriend is taking a dirt nap."

Fang was sitting next to him, his long legs cross in front of him. "Yeah," he breathed out with a sort of despair. "She is."

"This sucks," Iggy said darkly. "Who else but us end up in such a screwed up situation? As if the whole always getting kidnapped thing and the tortured as kids thing weren't enough. My girlfriend and your twin ends up dead, and a chick, her literal clone, ends up walking around all happy and crap as if nothing is wrong with the world."

"Suck it up," Fang said. "We're stuck with her. We don't know much about her. But we're stuck with her."

_Bam!_

Fang looked at the hole in the wall directly across from Iggy, the incriminating red rubber ball sticking out from the crumbling plaster.

"She can bring her back to life!" Iggy said, frustrated. "But she won't!"

Fang rolled his eyes again, "She has to have some reason for it. Try not to push her, will you?"

"She's not Tally, so quit acting like she is, Fang…" Iggy said, glaring straight ahead.

"Don't you think I know that, you dumbass? But that doesn't mean we can force her to do anything. Hell, she might even be after our necks with all the crap she knows from the Facility. Just cool it, okay? Max has a plan."

* * *

"What do you think of this?" I asked, holding out a nice red halter top, with nothing but strings holding the back together.

Ella gave a pretty laugh, her brown eyes twinkling some, "Sure! But won't that be hard to hide your wings in?"

I smirked, "Yeah. But just about everyone knows about wings. So what's the big deal. Now these?"

And it went on like that, just fooling around in shops and running off when we saw anyone with cameras.

We had a ton of bags in hand when we started off back to the hotel. I had a few more than Ella, out of courtesy.

Yeah, it was a miracle, a rabble-rouser like me being courteous? Well, hell yes, Ella made me feel like I wasn't party crashing on the Flock.

Then a horrible thought occurred to me. Would she have ever done this with Tally? I mean, I know my original was all touchy feely when it came to the Flock but was she as accommodating to someone like Ella? Someone who was normal for the most part? I voiced my questions.

"Oh, Tally was nice. She didn't like going out with me much, but she did go out with the younger kids and Iggy a lot. Max said that she even managed to wrangle Fang out every once in a while. Tally was just sort of the quiet person who hung around with Nudge and Angel when they were at my place. Either that, or she was knocked out on a bed from some fight. Like most of the flock."

Ella flashed me a smile, "Tally was really…unique. And funny. Always trying to melt down tension by attacking Iggy somehow. Or teasing him, it always was an ice breaker."

"Ugh, I am _not_ gonna cozy up to Iggy to melt tension. He freaking hates me," I moaned, hanging my head.

"Probably because you really seem like Tally to him, finger prints and all, but you're not her. Like our Tally, but with her memory wiped and some contacts," she said, kicking a tin can forward.

I shook my head, hair flying everywhere.

I don't think I could really warm up to these people. They were just starting to seem to me exactly like the clones I interacted with day-to-day in the past, no matter how their files misled me to think they could be different and more humane.

Great, and now I sound like a stupid whiner.

When we finally reached the hotel (nothing too ritzy, just a Holiday Inn), I found the wall now had a small hole in it, the small region around it caved in to it and cracked. I look directly across from it and found the guy who seemed to hate me the most, glaring right at me.

I shuddered and continued to my side of the room. "We brought food, if ya want any," I said, opening one of the bags to reveal a few boxes of pizza and spaghetti. "We didn't know if you guys wanted anything specific, because I hear that people tend to like certain things when they're out in the open, so I got a box of the ones that sounded like they were edible. Ella helped of course, nearly got the anchovy one but she told me no—none of you would like it so yeah."

I opened one of the boxes, the heavenly smell of pepperoni and cheese and sauce wafting into the air. I picked a slice of the Hawaiian one up, the cheese gooey, glistening and handed it to Ella.

Then I got one for myself, and I swear to anyone who will listen to me it was pure heaven to have a bite of that in my mouth. So, in went that one, and off I went starting on a second one.

"Wow, Violet, you make it seem like you've never had pizza before!" Ella exclaimed.

"I haven't," I muttered with a hand over my mouth, not wanting to let Ella see the mashed up food in my mouth. "I never got that far into Integration. Oh wow, this is _so_ good!"

By now, the rest of the Flock had just leaked into the room, the wondrously delicious pizza obviously having baited them. I poured my self some weird greenish-yellow soda from a bottle before serving them all, making sure all the slices were evenly distributed. Eventually, I just gave each of them a box and went off to do my own merry thing.

When we were all done, I saw Angel playing with a little stuffed animal.

Mm, maybe I really could get on there good sides.

I looked at her little stuffed animal, zeroing in on the gold stitching used for the halo, the pink for the nose, the big glassy blue eyes and the white downy fur…then I concentrated on leaking an energy source through it.

Soon enough, the bear had wiggled away from Angel and was tap dancing and spinning around.

The Flock gaped, looking between the bear and me. Finally, Gazzy asked, "Are you doing that?"

I nodded, still focusing on the bear. It was now doing a sort of clunky ballet and trying to tickle Angel.

"You can bring things to life!" Nudge exclaimed. "Oh my God, Tally, that is sooooo cool, can you bring a towel to life? Oh! What if you brought Spaghetti to life! Wow, would it complain about being eaten? Oh wow maybe you shouldn't do Spaghetti! How about roses?"

Immediately, I let the bear fall to the ground with a muffled thud on the beige carpet, my vision blurring a bit. "I'm sorry, Nudge. I'm not Tally. I'm Violet."

With that, I took off, on the warpath back to the Facility.

* * *

I spent the rest of the day inside of the Facility, going through files, trying to see if I could find any documents that had the words "GUNNER IS HERE! DR. GRACE IS HERE! FANG II IS HERE!" and stuff like that because honestly, how would you like to be thrown into the lives of people who didn't even give a flying damn about you. They were only self-absorbed and completely focused on themselves.

God I hate people sometimes.

I sifted through all the files as fast as I could. When I got a bit tired I leaned back in my gray swivel chair and looked at the room. Of course, it just looked like a filing cabinet threw up. And I was at the center of this huge mess, spinning around in circles. There was one of those light thingies used for x-rays, and on the other side there was a two way mirror.

I shook my head and began my searching again.

Okay, so maybe if I couldn't find Gunner or that horrible Fang II, hell, maybe even those who were sent to Germany, I could at least find Dr. Grace. She was always very good with this stuff, whereas I was completely inept and about as good at this as I was at Brain Surgery.

For the slow ones, I mean, I majorly sucked at researching things like this.

Heaving another sigh, I continued my sifting through the pages; which is when I came across a very nice file dealing with cryopreservation…

See, normally, I would have put that in the "crap" area, but no. What caught my eye was the fact that the idiot flock were on it. More accurately, they were on it and so were every single experiment that ever had wings grafted onto their backs or were altered.

Greeat.

I huddled all the papers together and set out of the Facility, nodding at a few people who said hi, and made my way to the nearest Café.

I was going to need a Caffeine IV to survive the night of research. Hell yes.

And I was going to need a miracle to ever be able to talk to that Flock again about what I was looking for.

After all, what reason did anyone have for putting my original in a preservation tank if not to try and body-snatch her?

Or, just plain kidnap her.


	4. The Chocolate Factory Threw Up

My huge problem with life is the fact that I was brought into it against my will.

And on top of being here _against my will_, I am a person who technically does not exist without any parents whatsoever and dangerous powers.

Honestly, I'd be fine if I had somehow died in one of scientists' trials right about now.

The Flock hates me.

That's a simple thought that I've been thinking about so long that I'm pretty sure at this point either my brain is turning into pink goo inside my skull and leaking out of one ear or that dang thought is permanently branded there like some stupid tattoo you really regret getting.

I have no idea why they didn't let me just die in my nice little tank. I was perfectly fine there! I had the liquid stuff in there, the furnishing and all the nice fix ups that came with such a _luxury_ model of goo-filled tanks.

Maybe not.

Maybe I am _finally_ going nuts from thinking so hard about things when I was clearly not created to think so much. That was what those chicks and dudes in the whitecoats were there for with their fancy-schmancy degrees and PhDs and all those wrinkles on their hundred-percent human faces.

"Violet?" came a voice from directly behind me, causing me to jump, flail around and crash onto the floor in a mini-tornado of files and papers.

"Oh my!" Dr. Martinez exclaimed, coming to help me up. I waved her away and tried to create some system of organization for the papers.

"How can I help you, Dr. Martinez?" I asked in the most stuck-up and smarticle voice I could conjure up.

"I just came here to apologize for Nudge. She really didn't mean to call you Tally—"

I stopped her right there. "Dr. Martinez, I know that the Flock has gone through some, like, majorly tough times, all right? I _know._ But, face it, the only reason you guys have me there is because you don't know what to do with me. I look like Tally, I'm dangerous, period. Being treated like that…is just something I'm starting to get used to."

Dr. Martinez looks me straight in the eyes, something that I'm not entirely used to. "If you're starting to get used to it the way you say, then how come you ran out when Nudge made an accident and called you Tally?"

I wince and remain silent, shuffling papers and making sure the papers that were important were far away from her.

The silence is enough answer for her.

"See, you just have to give them time to get used to the idea of another flock member being around," she says warmly, placing a hand on my shoulder and giving it a good squeeze.

"And this has nothing to do with the fact that those people are under the impression that I can bring people back to life?" I mutter vehemently, shrugging her hand off and going back to my seat. I eye the cup of coffee on the desk and the massacred sugar packets—long since emptied—and make note to get another cup as soon as this lady leaves.

"I can't speak for them, but I can say that they are really hoping you return to the hotel to talk with them in person, Violet," she gets up, and moves to the door, "Just think about it, okay?" and with that, she closes the door behind her.

* * *

"She is completely and totally immature," Max said, wandering through the streets with the Flock. "Violet can't just shrug it off like anyone normal? I mean its _Nudge_, _she's twelve,_ she's allowed to make mistakes."

Iggy shrugged, "That chick didn't take it that way. She just stormed out like the idiot she is."

Max scowled. She knew that Violet wasn't necessarily a very important person to her, but honestly, Iggy could give her some slack at least.

"She's stressed. Getting out of the place that has been your jail for fifteen years can do that to you," she intoned steering her flock into a chocolate shop. It really was understandable. Tally wasn't a big ray of sunshine when she came to the Flock.

No, she was pretty cooped up and worried that she'd get caught and dragged back and also worried that she wasn't accepted into the Flock.

Though Max was pretty sure Iggy changed her mind that day, what with him trying to talk with her (through touch and words) and trying to see what she looked like.

"Didn't Tally do that a few times too?" Gazzy asked before his eyes widened till they looked like huge serving platters and he took off to the display case, where all kinds of chocolate creations just sat looking out and tempting people who entered.

"Yeah, actually, she did. She _always_ took off or got real quiet when something was bugging her."

Fang fixed her with a look that said, _Watch what you say because Iggy might rip your head off for even comparing them._

Max returned it with one of her own _I know what I'm doing Fang, I have a plan_ looks.

"Or when she just wanted to think," Iggy said with a rueful smile on his features. He could almost imagine her standing right next to him, a finger through his belt loop and the other hand in his, running an internal monologue and telling him something like _Oh God Iggy! Its like Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory threw up here and we can take it all!_ _Buahaha!_

Of course he'd be the first to think how weird it was that she had some sort of obsession with that movie. But he'd smile at her, probably give her a peck on the cheek and try to look for something together that would be great.

He was so distracted he completely missed the conversation Max had with Fang about returning to the Facility to find out what Violet could possibly be doing.

Max, noticing how his mind wandered a bit, tried snapping her fingers in front of his face. "Earth to Iggy! Come on, we gotta get to the Facility!"

"Huh?" he asked as Max yanked on his hand. His _injured_ hand. "YOW! MAAAX!"

* * *

"Hello?" I ask into the phone, twirling my hair in my hands. "Is this Dr. Candace Grace?"

From the end of the line, I hear crackling before a voice I've heard for all my experimental life comes on, "Speaking. And you might be?"

"You should know me, Grace, it's Violet," I say simply, hearing sounds from the outside of the door.

"Violet? You're ali—"

"From the Facility, yes, I was calling to tell you that I'm out. And wondering if you knew where the heck Gunner is," I mutter, narrowing my eyes at the white painted metal door once I see the Flock traipsing in, varying emotions on their faces. Iggy, for one, looked completely lost, it was that, or I was just a bit too frazzled from hearing the familiar voice on the phone.

"Gunner? I got a message from him just two weeks ago saying that he found you _dead in a tomb!" _she practically screeched at me. But this was Dr. Grace we were talking about. She knew better than to compromise anything and scream at us. I on the other hand, had no problem compromising my position since that was a matter I wouldn't have to worry about in such a nice and security ridden Facility.

"Excuse me?" I yelled into the receiver. "Grace, I've been locked up in here for ages! I'm obviously not dead so what in the world would possess Gunner to think that I _was dead!_"

Iggy's eyes are wide as they stare at me. Fang smoothly walks over and hits the speaker button on the office phone.

"From what he told me, who he thought was you was pretty banged up, bruises, middle torn up, the whole enchilada," she said rather blankly, calling up what she remembered.

"Did she have scars on her throat?" Iggy asked suddenly, choked up and frantic, dangerously close to me as he slammed his freckled hand near the phone.

"Who are you?" Grace shot off. "Violet, did you allow others to hear you speak to me?"

"Grace, answer the damn question. It's just Gunner's original, nothing to worry about," I say darkly, glaring at the phone much in the same way as Iggy was. The tension in the room was starting to really kill me.

"It could have been possible. He simply said he dug up the body, stole the preservation tank and took off somewhere."

"Any clues? He didn't tell you where he was going?" I asked, grasping at straws. With this, I suddenly had a new reality blooming before my eyes. I could live my life far away from these kids while being happy with Gunner.

"He mentioned briefly something about the abandoned Itex labs but I couldn't make much of it considering how panicked he sounded."

"That good, Dr. Grace. I'll call you when I've finished explaining this to the Originals."

"You're going to give this information to the ones who we've been trying to surpass for years?" Dr. Grace asked hesitantly, I could almost imagine the little woman biting at her nails in confusion.

"Of course, they broke me out of here in the first place anyways. And it's their Flock member—not me—that Gunner has kidnapped. Bye." And with that I hung up the phone.

This left me with the task of addressing the Flock who were thoroughly confused and waiting for some sort of explanation as to why I was talking about Gunner kidnapping someone from their flock when their flock was all there... and yet not.

I silently took them in.

I owed them big time for breaking me out of this place, for endangering their lives for other experiments. Even if I knew that they really were just trying to look out for themselves, I would likely have to save their lives hundreds of times over to repay the favor they did to me.

Yes, in the hours left to myself in a dust filled, dingy office, I managed all of the Zen and peaceful thoughts.

Gunner always _did_ call me the bipolar one.

And now I realized how banged up they were from their attempt at escaping a place like the Facility. The scar running from Iggy's ear and disappearing into his shirt was horrible, let alone how I just now notice the way they hid their scars. Angel almost always holding her bear in front of her chest, as if protecting it from harm, how Max never let her wings out, how Gazzy always wore long sleeves and gloves even if it was blistering outside, the slight limp Fang carried, Total's bandage and how Nudge went quiet for extended periods of time despite how she was usually described as a motor mouth.

So I motioned for them to take a seat and took out the files that I had discovered over the last few days.

"What was that about?" Max shot off almost as soon as I got ready to explain.

"Asking Dr. Grace where Gunner could be," I answered, looking around to see if I still had coffee somewhere; anywhere but those horribly accusing brown eyes of the Flock leader.

"Who is Dr. Grace?"

"Like your Jeb. The Facility was determined to make the clones better, so when Max II failed under Jeb, they put her with us and put her to train us and create a bond of trust with her," I murmured silently. "She then met Jeb and was trying to figure out a way of letting us out in the same way. She warmed up to us in the way only a mother could."

"And you're confident she won't betray you? We're still leery of Jeb as it is," Max almost growled the name out.

"We are, yes. Or at least were. Once they told us we were failures and slated for termination, you guys waltzed in and then turned all the attention on yourselves. She managed to escape."

"Ok. Now, what was that all about someone being kidnapped?"

And then we get to the heavy things.

"I believe that Gunner thought one of your Flock was me. That would be the only reason for the preservation tank considering my powers. But…"

Iggy's jaw dropped in completely and utter surprise, almost choking as he came to the reality of my words. "He kidnapped Tally? Tally's alive?"

* * *

Gunner was frustrated beyond belief. He had been driving across stated with a stolen car, Violet was pretty dang shredded inside her tank in the back seat, but she was reviving herself as quick as she usually did!

He sighed, pulling off an exit and looking for a good motel to stay at in some obscure city in Georgia.

Sure, Gunner was strong, but fact to the matter was, he wasn't the kind to be able to deal with the emotional troubles as well as Violet did. Violet could turn her problems around after a while and look at the positive things—a rare thing to come from a girl born in a lab just as he was.

She once got beat near an inch of her life by one of the Alex series. It was a one on one fight, but not a death match, merely to see the effectiveness of the series against the original flock. The theory was, if the Alex series could kill one of the more diluted of the clones, than they would be able to subdue the Originals no problem. However, the scientists had done extremely wrong when they paired the kid up against Violet, who could bring most experiments to their knees if motivated enough.

The usually kind girl had later told him that it was a tough fight. No matter how much she tried to enter the kid's brain to mess with it, no matter the intensity she tried to bring her level of blasts up to; the kid wouldn't give. She had to resort to combat, which wasn't exactly her strong suit.

But while she laid broken in the containment rooms with him (Dr. Grace having convinced the scientists they would need all of the Sector 8 experiments they could preserve to capture the Original Flock.) she had told him that she was sort of glad that the Alex Experiment had forced her to fight him without powers. It only meant that she had to work harder in order to surpass Talon Gh05t.

Once he got the key to the motel room, he made sure that no one was watching him as he unloaded the preservation tank and dragged it into his room.

Then, he sat in a chair, observing the minute movements of her stomach, and the many monitors on the side of the tank that monitored her revival.

He would have to wait just a few more days before she made a full recovery, he hoped.

Then he'd be able to tell her exactly how he felt.

He settled back into his chair, taking a big bite out of the candy bar he had stowed in his backpack.

But Gunner couldn't help but wonder, when the hell did Violet get time to take a knife to her hair and make bangs?

* * *

"Ok, there is a very _small_ possibility that she is alive, yes, but that doesn't necessarily mean that she is as alive as you or me," I backtracked, throwing up my hands in front of me, glancing around the Flock and taking in their shocked expressions.

"How did you come to that? There wasn't anyone who could have possibly fooled all of us into thinking that she was dead while we were in that hospital," Fang muttered intuitively, fixing me with a stare that could have potentially frozen me, the room and all of kingdom come into cute-sy little popsicles and _then_ some.

I took a minute to gather my thoughts, more so the theories I had come up with before they had come in. "Well, we are in one of many institutions branching out from the Facility and the School; the School branching out from Itex. I doubt it would have taken Kravtsov much for her to simply start 'handling' all of Itex."

"That still doesn't answer how Tally could suddenly be alive again!" Gazzy intervened, his big blue eyes shining in earnest; I could just see how he _wanted_ Tally to be alive again. To have that familiar warmth of someone he knew just as I needed my version Gazzy.

I looked straight at him for a moment, trying to convey as much hope in my eyes as I possibly could without looking like their was something funky with _my_ digestive tract and then moved on to speak to the rest of the Flock. "There are many scientists in this place that had two jobs. And it just so happened the hospital you were admitted to was owned by a branch of Itex, under a different name."

"And that would mean they could have slipped Tally something to make her seem dead to us. And when those people pushed for her to be in the preservation tank after we told them we wouldn't let them dissect her…"

"This is just the icing on the cake!" Total exclaimed with newfound confidence. "Talon would have just stayed in a death like state much like Juliet Capulet and then after a period of time in the preservation tank she would awake and look for her loyal companions! It's brilliant!"

"Total, a lot of whitecoats did this. Our enemies," Angel said quietly, looking down at the Scottie dog with the most serious face a seven year old could manage.

And then the dog made a look that almost looked regretful for calling the scientists brilliant.

God, I needed a vacation from all this experiments crap, it was making me completely and totally loopy.

"In theory, yes, that could have happened. And then Gunner, thinking it was me, took me away. The preservation tanks are all over the place here simply because the scientists liked seeing how long it would take me to come around from different poisons with my powers."

Fire practically burned in Iggy's sightless eyes as he stepped forward, the overhead light casting eerie shadows across his freckled cheeks. "Okay then, we go rescue Tally again!"

I gritted my teeth and looked up at him, "And we get Gunner too!"

* * *

**A/N: You guys really thought I'd let Tally die that easily? At the end of a chapter? Things all tied up? With the possibilities running through my mind? Pssh, you must not know me. I didn't earn the title (that I so gratefully accept) of the female James Patterson with all nice tied up endings. I always throw wrenches into things. ^-^ Please review, and remember, my characters can be alive one moment and dead the next, who knows! REVIEW! Critiques are welcome!**


	5. Of Vinegar Chips and Medication

The preparations that were made in order to go save someone made my head spin from how unnecessary and downright retarded they were.

Let the record show, that this was all because the damn world felt bad that the Flock had been locked up.

That, and because the death of anyone of them could quite possibly bring about the Apocalypse. After all, these idiots weren't called the Apocalypse children for the hell of it. They had deadly powers and an innate potential to decimate the entire human population.

Notice I say human. The mutants would probably be well off and alive as is, all happy and stuff, having more little cuddly baby mutants and making little baby mutant ninja turtles.

Haha, funny.

Well, these human people were feeling guilty and all boo-hoo we need to satisfy our guilty conscience and try to get on the winged people's good side so they don't kill us and blow us all to smithereens.

Attention! All idiot humans who want to be helpful! You're _not_ helpful! You're annoying and you are getting in the way of what would usually be a simple pack-and-go operation!

Proper water-proof backpacks, space bars, a freaking tent. Why the hell would we need a tent? Really? We have no need to camp out in the forests when we could waltz into just about anyone's home and be all "Hey, Joe, we need to crash here" and they'd be all "Oh, sure Winged People of the Apocalypse just make sure to clean up when you're done!" "Yeah yeah Joe, whatever you say." "My name isn't Joe!"

Yeah it would totally be that easy.

Then again, there _are _ crazy scientists out their just drooling over their monitors and keyboards and tech-y stuff waiting for us to just dramatically fall into their laps.

"What the hell do we need a parachute for?" I told this rather petty looking woman who was trying to inform us on the proper way to survive.

She had big red hair, a blue ensemble and a funky cap that indicated she was in the Navy, I guess. Little blue horn-rimmed glasses were perched on the edge of her hooked nose and specks of yellow saliva seemed to spatter from her bulbous, wrinkly lips whenever she moved to talk. She just seems like the type of person you would see manning a desk at a Library in old shows rather than someone whose in the Navy trying to teach bird kids about survival.

"Ahem," I interrupt her as soon as she tries to explain to everyone how to activate the parachute. The flock and everyone swivel around to stare at me with the same exasperated look I bet I have on. The lady gives me a steady glare and grunts her permission to let me talk. So I do, in a rather snarky manner: "Why would we ever need parachutes?"

"I 'ready 'splained dat mizzy. Is in case yous happen to fall out da plane."

"Alrighty," I cross one of my arms and prop my chin up on my hand, cocking a hip. "So, you mean to tell me that our wings are just going to spontaneously stop functioning? That rather than opening these huge things that are already attached to our backs, you want us to add a whole, what? Twenty more pounds? Onto our backs. What if we're attacked? Oh yeah 'Hold on Max! I need to get my parachute!' Hell no. Now if you would please shut the hell up and let us be on our way, it'd be greatly appreciated," I finish with a burning black look.

The grotesque lady gives me a searing glare (like that will kill me) and turns on her heel and walks away with a funny crook in her step and click-clack of her shoes.

"Finally!" Gazzy exclaims and lets out a sigh of relief. "I thought she'd never shut her mouth. Thanks Violet."

"No problem, lil' guy. I was getting tired of all her nonsensical bullcrap," I squat down to tie my black sneakers up. I was wearing the little red halter top with the open back Ella picked out with me. So anyone who stood behind me could see the series of scars going up and down my back along with the exact point where my feathers stopped and my skin began.

Max shakes her head above me. She so did not accept how I wore whatever the hell I wanted. Or how I let my long as heck hair fall down to my thighs, parted down the middle. She didn't understand how I could fight like this either.

Thing is, I usually don't use my hands or body to fight.

* * *

A soft shimmer filters through the dingy and dirty motel room, and Gunner's head whips around to stare at Violet.

Weird things kept happening. Shimmers through the room as if it was baking hot and they were at a desert, flashes of scenes Gunner had never in his life seen, even though at times he could swear he saw himself in them. Visions of the end of the world, visions of flying above the cities—which, as far as he knew, Violet had never in her life seen for herself—and then visions of the typical torture caused by the Facility personnel. However, there was a particular scene in which there was no sight. Simply a feeling of being let free, and the sound of Erasers (hadn't those been eradicated long ago?) at his heels.

As far as he knew, Violet never had that power.

He hauled a bucket of water and ice next to the bed where her preservation tank was and tended to his injuries. He gently wiped at the dried blood, revealing the small, superficial wounds beneath all the gore and spittle. Of course, not all the blood was his. He had to tear apart quite a few experiments and henchmen in order to get to Violet.

And it was no easy task.

He had to dig up the gravesite, only to realize that what was in the huge hole in the ground was a decoy coffin. And that in order to get to her, he would have to break into the cryopreservation storage area at the Facility. He had to get through a bunch of security checks and steal her tank away, being careful not to jostle any of the tubes that were provinding her with nutrients and oxygen.

He sighed and continued to wipe away at the blood in the faint blue glow of the cryopreservation tank, his own fluorescent green eyes zeroing in on every speck of gore on him.

"You need to finish waking up already, Vi," he muttered. "I can't do all this without my old fighting partner."

Unbeknownst to Gunner, the girl inside the cryopreservation tank had her eyes wide open and was staring at him, her black hair curling and floating about her in a ghostly manner, tubes sticking in and out of her. _Iggy?_ She wondered silently.

_

* * *

Iggy?_

Iggy's eyes snapped open and he started looking from side to side. "Tally!"

"For the last time," I muttered, flipping in the air so I was flying upside-down, black hair fanning behind me. "It's me you big oaf."

"No! I swear I heard Tally!" He insisted, suspended in one spot in the air, twisting his head from side to side as if to hear something better.

All of us looped around in a big arc and came back to stare at him. Max and Fang gave each other one of their trademark, thousand-word looks and then focused their attention on the spazzing six-foot-something bird boy.

"Yo, have you taken your meds today?" I asked sarcastically. "'Cause your girl isn't here with us so she couldn't have possibly have just talked to you. Plus, she's _mute._"

"Shut up!" Iggy said, getting up in my face and almost causing us both to go spiraling towards the ground from getting our wings tangled up together. I smacked his sandy colored wings with my black ones.

"Dude! Chill!"

"No! I heard Tally in my head!" he kept on.

Right as I was about to declare him completely nuts, Max and Fang stepped (flew) in and sort of squeezed me out of the picture.

"Are you sure?" Fang asked in a low gravelly voice that annoyed the _hell_ out of me.

Iggy nodded his head, strands of his orange-ish hair getting even more tussled and windblown. "I swear, it's exactly how she mind talks to me."

Max nodded while I did lazy circles around the kids and Total, humming an idle song that went along the lines of "Why the hell is Violet here?"

"That must mean we're close to Tally," the all mighty fearsome leader Max said, putting her hands on her hips and looking like a pseudo-Wonder Woman.

But then I realized what that meant and I halted in midair and punched the air, "That means we're near Gunner! YES!"

"We should rest up then," Max said, signaling the younger kids to go land.

"WHAT?" Iggy and I screeched almost at the same time.

"But we're so damn near Gunner!"

"Tally is right there! We can rescue her right now!"

"Shut up!" Max roared over our protesting voices, seeming like a feral kitten. "I know you both want to go right now, believe me, I do too! But we've been flying for hours! We're in no condition to go busting doors and searching for Tally or Gunner! Nudge, Gazzy, Angel and Total can barely keep up with the pace we were making! So let's just rest up and go after them as soon as we've rested up!"

Iggy and I turned to "look" at each other, the eerie shades of orange and red the sunset was casting on us making us look more deranged and crazy than we normally looked.

"Fine," we both muttered at the same time.

As soon as we landed, we raided a gas station for a ton of crap food and got ourselves a motel room with a funky black van in the parking lot.

I picked at my salt and vinegar chips, looking at the kids as they fought over what channel to leave the TV on, Mythbusters or MTV?

And I close my eyes.

As vivid as day, I call up a time when I was curled up against Gunner, listening to him as he hummed a soft tune he had picked up from the radio. We both thought we had been left for dead in a survival exercise. I had long gashes, my life bleeding out of my back, and Gunner had broken quite a few ribs. Neither one of us could possibly make the trip down to the stream we had found earlier, so we had curled up under the shade of a tree that was well hidden among bushes.

We fully expected to die.

But the scientists caught sight of us from one of the many cameras hidden throughout the jungle to monitor what we do and make behavioral notes on us. They came, hauled us into the labs, patched us up, and locked us up in our holding cell in Sector 8 to wait for the next hellish thing they had in store for us.

I stretch out on the ground, lacing my hands behind my head and staring up at the ceiling.

As far as I was concerned, those were the good days.

The days before Gunner was taken away from my branch of the Facility and I was left to rot, without meaning—killing everything I was told to kill without any question as to the morality whatsoever.

Soon enough, no one was awake except for Iggy and me.

And he kept looking across at the wall and concentrating on it. When I asked what the hell was up with him, he just grunted and said it was none of my business.

So I shrugged, pulled on a hoodie and wandered out of the motel room into the parking lot, where kids were smoking what I could only describe as something rolled up in paper. I walked the distance between our motel room and the black van I don't know how many times.

My mind was on so many things, I don't think anyone would've been able to keep up with it.

What would I do when I finally came face to face with Gunner again?

Would he accept me for who I turned into?

Or would he shun me for giving into the scientists and turning into another one of their murdering pawns?

I had never known Gunner to shun anyone. He had a pretty short temper, but around me he tended to be sweet. Likely because we together right from the start. We were humane and kind to each other only because we had taught one another what hurt and what didn't. We were patient in our early years, guiding the other when teaching them something they didn't know.

A secret smile flitted to my lips as I thought of a time when we were about six, and huddled up with Baby Boy and Baby Girl. When he was peppering Baby Girl's face with little kisses simply to make her smile. That little purse of the lips he would to, feigning a pout, when we started teasing him.

Could Iggy ever be like Gunner?

Or better yet, could I ever find love with Gunner like Tally did with Iggy?

I doubt it.

Gunner had street smarts, but wasn't the smoothest feather on a wing when it came to relationships and emotional stuffs.

I got up from where I had been sitting on the sidewalk, and entered the motel room with a new resolve.

As soon as I saw Iggy hunched over his backpack, I strode over to him. He cocked his head for a moment, trying to identify who the footsteps he heard belonged to.

I ducked down to whisper in his ear, "Let's go get your girl."

His head turned up to look at me, the dull moonlight illuminating his pale face and highlighting the freckles that dusted his cheeks and nose. His lips twisted into a mischievous smirk and his blue eyes quirked up. "That's the best thing you've said to me. Let's go."


	6. Sniff 'Em Out ScoobyDoo

"So, what's up with the whole, 'I hear my mute girlfriend' thing, buddy?" I asked Iggy, hoping he wouldn't bite my head off. (God that would be unpleasant if it happened in real life. "CHOMP" "OOOOOOOOOOW.")

Iggy spared me a quick blue-eyed glare before sighing and stuffing his hands in his pockets, "Our genes evolved to adapt to our communication problems. I can hear her voice in my head. Its the only way we really talk, other than the system of taps and clicks we made to try and speak to each other."

I quirked an eyebrow, and kicked a can away as we walked down the sidewalk. "So, basically, your genes must have sensed she was your..._mate_ and then through accelerated evolution, adapted to both of your disabilities? Damn, that's awesome."

Violet made note of the absence of the van that had been there when she was walking around.

A slow, mutual silence stretched as we reached the edge of the parking lot, where the forest began, shadows casting everywhere. We still had to walk quite a bit till we reached a clearing and could take off, but we couldn't risk anyone seeing our wings. Obviously, some nosy kid would start the ruckus and then screaming and it'd be worse then if a little tween pop star stripped to his underwear in the middle of serial rapists. Lots of screaming, lots of hysterical shrieking, and unnecessary noise that would alert the Flock that we were gone.

Obviously, we were trying to be sneaky, and a pissed off Max would just result in us getting our asses handed to us for leaving without her.

Who did this bitchy Max think she was, anyways?

Coddling all those kids as if it would help them survive in the world.

The Facility taught us to fend for ourselves, and we were stronger for it. It was difficult as hell to try and kill those of us that survived in Sector 8, and that was for the reason that we lived for ourselves.

At least, it was hard to kill us, unless we wanted to die.

Cookie, for instance, was the first of us to ever escape. She made it out into the open and lived her life for a couple of years. She made a cozy house with some rogue scientist, went to a boring human school, found love in some computer geek.

Essentially, breaking out so that all the survival skills she had learned previously could be eroded and dulled.

She wanted that stupid fairy tale life, the idealistic house, the idealistic husband, the 2.5 kids and an idiot's job at some little preschool.

Preschool.

A damn trained, highly dangerous recombinant DNA life-form turning over all she knew for some crock pot fantasy. She never even listened to reason when all of us started listing how she would get dragged back by the hair of her eyebrows.

And of course, they did.

When they captured her and brought her back she looked so lively, with long hair and a sort of deviant air in her step that the meek girl had never had before.

But she had been broken down by the humanity of the world. By love and relaxation. Just as we had told her would happen.

Her fighting skills had been dulled, and her abilities were starting to fade with disuse.

However, after a good amount of vigorous training, she got up to a meager amount of what she was before. Performing the acrobatic movements we were all taught, the fighting styles, the espionage skills, and strength training.

They trained her until she coughed up blood and only a bit of her skin was left its normal color from how harshly the Goblins and us other experiments beat on her. They even had to cut her hair because of how much of a nuisance it was becoming to her to be yanked by it. Probably the last good tactical move she'd ever made. Sadly the last good mood she'd ever made was cutting her hair. Not exactly something to brag about.

But even then that wasn't enough to restore her to her former glory. She used to be the best of us, right up there with Max 2.

Then again, Max 2 was deployed on a mission to infiltrate the Flock and kill them—and she created bonds with the Eraser, Ari.

Cookie found love with a boy named Kaiden.

So who was left of good old Sector 8?

The Alex clones were completely decimated, only a step above Cookie.

Cookie was dead. Having taken her lover Kaiden who turned out to be a mastermind with computers. All under the reign of a rogue scientist named Jeb Batchelder.

Max 2 was nowhere to be found, having disappeared off the radar following all the humans raiding the Itex base in Germany.

Fang 2 was God knows where. He took off almost as readily as Cookie had, but he actually had some sense of survival to him. He didn't live on fantasies. Well, at least, fantasies other than that of sucking the blood of some poor bambi out there. The damn kid had fangs and loved using them for defense and to see poor animals and experiments alike suffer.

Nudge 2, and Baby Girl Angel were sent to Germany, and last I heard of it that place had been blown to smithereens.

Baby Boy was dead. At my own hands. His blood was forever tainting the very depths of my soul—but like I said. Even though I feel remorse for his death, I'd pick the same choice again and again. The Facility taught us to be strong and fend for ourselves.

Which left me and Gunner as the last known survivors of Sector 8.

My reanimation and psionic blast.

His kinetic absorption and shooting.

The last of the deadly trio.

Now a deadly duo. Not as effective as the trio but I suppose it would get the job done. Gunner and I had been partners forever and a year.

I sighed.

"Hey, you, we can start flying now, we're far away enough," Iggy said from my left, his huge wings already extended out and poised to jump into the air.

Without hesitation, I jump into the air, relishing in the night airs breeze and how it weaves through the feathers of my wings before I flap them to catch up to Iggy, inky hair whipping around behind me.

"My name is not 'Hey You' you big blind dumbass," I yell over the wind, hitting his wing with mine.

"I know," he says with a morosed look on his face. He looked as if he was about to say more but I let the conversation die.

Something tells me he doesn't say Violet because I remind him far too much of his Tally.

At least, that's why I don't call him Iggy.

He's so much like Gunner that it hurts to look at him.

* * *

"Max, wake up, we're about to be under attack!" Fang whispers, tapping his hand softly against the blonde girl's face.

The words "attack" were far more than enough to get Max to jump out of bed.

She scanned the room quickly, seeing Angel, Gazzy and Nudge peeking through a window at the parking lot outside. Nudge is babbling softly to Gazzy, already having collected most of the metal objects within the motel room, which wasn't much. Gazzy kept flexing his hands, a little flame flicker on his palms, but by the look of it, it pained him to do so. Angel was standing by ready. Total had hopped into Gazzy's backback.

But two people were missing.

"Where are Violet and Iggy?"

Fang shrugs, "They weren't here and they never woke me up for lookout. They probably took off by themselves to find Tally and Gunner."

"Dang it," Max whispers, grabbing her things and marching over to the dusty curtains. She used one finger to pull it back, one brown eye darting around and taking in the undulating shapes in the parking lot. She couldn't make a direct count of how many there were so she pushed off the wall and addressed her Flock.

"What are we up against?" Max asked in a strict, leader-ly tone that made everyone straighten up and report.

"Goblins," Fang said simply, tightening his backpack, aiming his pitch black eyes at their leader, chunks of shaggy hair shadowing his eyes.

"I sense some Alex Clones out there too Max," Angel intoned ominously. "They're searching for Violet and Tally."

"This isn't going to be an easy fight," said Nudge uneasily in response to the Alex clones comment, pulling at her kinky hair for a moment before working on making the metal cans she had found mold into sharp pointy objects.

"No worries, we can take them. You guys are the Apocalypse children!" Total said, giving a little doggy grin. Though he was grinning, it was obvious that he was just as frazzled as everyone else.

Max nodded, "Yeah, we're supposedly these kids meant to end the world right? We can totally take these things on. Just another battle guys, we can make it! No room for spazzing! Gazzy, do you have any bombs on you?"

A glint passed by his eyes, "No but I can finish the canon Iggy and I were making with a fire extinguisher last night!"

Max blinked but didn't even question why they found the need to try and make a canon instead of a regular bomb.

"Okay, get to it then, Angel, about how many are there?"

"Three times as much of them as there are us, Max," she said, closing her eyes momentarily, concentrating on the beings in the parkinglot..

"Okay, work on the Alex Clones out there, they're the tough part of the fight and it'd be best if none of us had to even physically fight one. Nudge, budge a window open, lure the Goblins to it and start launching what you can in the air, I'll go to the other window and do the same. Fang, you'll open the door for Gazzy. We'll be charging out there once Gazzy launches the canon to take out anything that's left."

"Got it!" And with that, each flock member went off to work on their individual role.

* * *

A loud banging noise from the cryopreservation tank brought Gunner's bright green eyes to the back of the van.

He had depart from the motel in the dead of the night and had to move.

Gunner had a gut feeling that something was going to the motel, something dangerous that he would be unable to handle. At least, not without Violet at his side to help him kick butt.

So he was driving once more, the gas pedal practically touching the floor as he left.

The sun was rising off in the distance, a hazy light beginning to illuminate the horizon.

But right now, he pulled over to the curb to figure out what the hell the banging was in the back of the van. Could the cryopreservation tank be failing? Could it finally be giving out on trying to supply Violet with what she needed to revive herself?

He crawled into the back of the van and looked at the blinking monitors of the tank, his eyebrows screwing together at the announcement.

"SEDATIVE REMOVAL COMPLETE" it blinked in bright red block letters against the black and green grid.

"Sedative...?" he muttered in a puzzled voice. "Since when do they sedate you Vi?" He pressed his hand against the tanks window, but snatched it away when the banging hit his hand. He swiped his hand over the place he had perched his hand and removed the condensation that had sat there, his eyes widening to the size of dinner plates when he saw a tanned fist repeatedly slamming into the window.

"Vi! You're awake! Hold on, kid, I'm getting you out of there!"

But Gunner was seriously unaware that the girl in their wasn't responding to the name Vi. She was responding to the freckled hands and trying to open the mental link that allowed Iggy to hear her voice.

_Iggy get me out!_

* * *

"Dammit!" Iggy halted in mid air.

I had to wheel around in a circle to see what the hell was wrong with him since I had been flying a bit ahead of him. And when I got to him I crossed my hands over my chest and tried to holler over the ravenous wind. It took extreme effort to remain in one general place.

"What's wrong?" I called out, scanning the pinkish clouds for anything that might come out to kick our skinny bird kid asses into rotisserie chicken.

"I hear Tally!" Iggy called out, turning his head around and around as if the poor girl would suddenly pop out and land him a sloppy one right on the lips, apologizing in some weird mixture of tongue clicks and tap dances about being gone for so long.

But then a recently overused lightbulb turned on over my head and I flew so I was practically right up in Iggy's face. "Can you ask her is Gunner is with her?"

Iggy screwed his eyes shut, "I can't ask her anything but she keeps calling out my name to open something."

I thought hard for a moment. "She's not calling out to you. Chances are, she's calling out to Gunner. You guys are exact replicas except for little aesthetics like eye color and vision. Whatever they drugged her with must have worn off if she's coming to."

"What do you mean sedatives? I thought they just gave her a possum-drug."

"Yes that's what they likely gave her at first, but it only lasts a limited amount of time. Meaning that they only injected her the minimum amount of times that they could have. That stuff is deadly. Too much exposure to it has killed tons of experiments before. So instead of having her waking up, chances are they had her drugged enough to where she was barely conscious of where she was."

Iggy nodded, "Okay then."

I blinked.

"Okay then, Scooby, go sniff out your girl!"

Iggy glared at me, "I'm not a dog, clone girl!"

I scoffed, "Nice comeback, ya idiot. You're so creative. Let's go before I tear out your spleen and make you eat it through a straw!"

I flapped my wings hard, trying to keep up with the hellish winds.

"Whatever!" Iggy said dismissively, then pointed in a direction, "The mind link seems to be stronger in that direction!"

Squinting my eyes, I forced them to search bellow the cloud line, trying to see any clue that might lead us in the correct direction.

"There's a road down there! The sign reads Florida Turnpike! Let's fly bellow the cloud line, by the treetops, until the link gets strong enough that we can point them out!"

Iggy's lips snarled, "No freaking duh! Let's go already!" he dove bellow me and hurling an obscene insult that would rot an elderly person's ears.

"Hey!" I dove after him, hurling various equally-rotting insults at him.


	7. Dark Blue, Dark Blue!

I recommend that you play Dark Blue for this chapter. :) But it's good either way :)

* * *

La La Lie

* * *

Iggy and I had been flying for what seemed like a millennium and a half, against raging winds. The sky was darkening and frothing, and cars bellow us were skidding across the sheets of water collecting on the gravel from the rain.

Honestly, I thought I was going to die—against the _weather_.

I realize how pathetic that sounds considering I was considered one of "the most dangerous clones," but give me a break man!

Here's a little secret, when it starts raining, bird kids have to land.

Why?

No, you stupid people in the back, it's not because birds can't fly in the rain. Our feathers have this special little oil that repels water.

It's because balancing in the air becomes a thousand times more difficult, not to mention visibility tends to go to hell.

So Iggy and I landed, cursing like sailors and shivering because on top of being wet, it happened to be cold.

Go figure.

It was one of those strange days in Florida where the wind flashed around and the sun was hiding, probably laughing at all of us, while we turned into birdy-flavored popsicle sticks.

Lovely.

After a while of trekking through the muddy swamp and muttering something totally not nice about how the blind kid could maneuver through twigs and snags better than I could, I came to my senses and gathered up my _huevos_ to say something to the unruly and love stricken bird boy.

"Yo! I don't think we're gonna get anywhere by contracting pneumonia!"

Iggy whipped around and regarded me with his pale, unseeing eyes. His strawberry blond hair was sticking to his forehead and pronounced cheeks, his pinks lips snarled up in defeat, showing off perfectly movie-star white straight teeth, "I know!"

"So?" I tried to sound as menacing as I could while shivering down to my toes in the cold; I crossed my arms and glared at him anyways. Not as if he could actually _see _how pathetic I looked at the moment.

His snarl melted away and what was left was a peaceful look on his face after a pregnant pause.

"Tally doesn't seem to be saying anything else, she muttered something about going back to sleep, but I guess it'll be alright to rest for a bit, maybe eat a bit."

I was about to open my mouth to retort when it sunk in that he actually agreed with me. Then, I just threw my hands up to the sky and said, "Finally! The boy sees reason!"

That was when the snarl came back so fast, I think I got whiplash and frostbite all in one go.

~.~.~

Tally tried her best to make it seem like she was sleeping on the bed in the back of the van.

The person who was driving…it wasn't Iggy.

It wasn't _her_ Iggy who would have smothered her with kisses and stupid puns and had blind eyes and would have been able to _hear her thoughts. _

The first thing the impostor did when he got her out was say, "Damn, Violet, you're really messed up kid."

Of course, her name wasn't Violet, so Tally detected the first clue right then and there.

Then when she tried to freeze this freak with glowing eyes, it didn't work.

And judging from the cryopreservation tank behind her, she evaluated that this whole situation was the result of the white coats.

But, she didn't have the energy to fight at the moment. The machine said she had no sedative left in her system, but in reality, she felt more tired than ever, more tired than after she broke out of the Facility.

So, she did what some people do in movies and pretended to pass out again when she flopped out of the tank.

And once more, the impostor grabbed her in an awkward way and pulled her over to the sleeping bag opposite the tank.

That was the final clue.

He grabbed her in such a way that suggested that he had never carried a girl, and awkwardly groped her to get her to the craptastic sleeping bag that looked like a black garbage bag stuffed with synthetic fluff.

Iggy had carried her numerous times and knew exactly where to put his hands on her body so that her wings wouldn't be bothered or any injury she had would not be jostled. It was _because_ he was blind that he was such an expert at carrying her—he just _had_ to be, he always tried to be the best at what he _could do_ to make up for what he _couldn't._

But this one seemed like he could both see and was making the best out of the awkwardness of carrying an unconscious bird girl.

So she feigned sleep.

And while she feigned sleep the impostor at some point opened the back of the van and dumped the preservation tank out into what she could see was a swamp, but Tally didn't mind.

That meant that in the event of a scuffle, she would have more room to move around and kick some serious butt.

But as she turned to her side and contemplated where the Flock was, she thought, _Iggy, please come back to me. _

~.~.~

When Iggy jumped up after devouring a bag of beef jerky and trail mix, I leapt to attention.

Rubbing my tired face, I moaned, "Jeezums, where's the fire dude?"

"I heard Tally!" He exclaimed, his eyes wider than ever looking around like a madman for what looked like the thousandth time since we had abandoned the Flock to look for our partners.

"Oh my Lanta are you a freaking broken record, you've been saying that for the _entire day!"_

And he just turned around, his eyes spitting blind sparks at me, "She's on the road! I can hear her _so _clearly! And that means your stupid Gunner is there too!"

Gunner?

Gunner.

Gunner!

In less than what seemed like seconds I had gathered my things, zipped up our backpacks, and was standing next to him saying, "Well what are you waiting for then, Mr. Smarty Pants?"

So that was how the both of us ended up flying close to the road, the kid having me scan while he acted like some strange canine hearing a dog whistle, directing me in the general direction that he could hear Tally.

~.~.~

In the end, Max had managed to get the Flock the heck out of the hotel. And for that, she was extremely relieved.

Being attacked by Goblins was one of the worst things that could happen to them considering their injuries, but getting attacked by Alex clones too just about broke all of them.

They had managed to blow a hole through the main defenses of the enemies with a huge cannon that the Gasman had managed to fix up with some help of Fang.

The fire extinguisher looked like some strange abomination with a ton of kitchen utensils and bathroom utensils attached to it, and none of the flock really wanted to challenge Gazzy and ask him how in the name of heck he had managed to even start that with Iggy, let alone finish it, but he did.

It even had letters on the side that read "The Terminator," and when Max gave Fang a questioning look, he shrugged and answered, "They saw a couple of the movies a while ago."

And so, they wrenched open the door to the motel, Iggy fell onto his knees with the cannon on his shoulder and cackled, "Hasta la vista baby!"

With that, a huge ball went speeding out of the cannon's mouth and into the horde of goblins and Alex clones.

Max let out a whoop of victory when it blew a hole right through their defenses, but son after, she yelled, "Up and away!" so that the rest of the flock could escape.

She scooped up Angel and threw her into the air while Fang threw Gazzy into the air and Nudge picked up Total so that he wouldn't be left behind with the speed they would be going at to escape the Goblins.

But one question remained on Max's mind, would they ever be able to escape the demons of the School and Facility?

A pang of horrid anger hit her with that thought, and she stopped mid air when she saw that the Goblins were following them in that eerily staggering speed, and that they were about thirty seconds away from a construction site.

Max may have lost her ability to go into full Super sonic speed, but that didn't stop her telekinesis from kicking in.

She looked like an avenging angel when she turned around to face the Globlins, the clouds behind her were darkening dangerously and her blonde hair was whipping all around her. Her lips twisted into a snarl as she lifted her arms at right angles, palms down and slowly.

Behind her, with a series of clangs and rumbles, the construction site began to lift clear out of the dirt, streams of sand falling from some of the tractors and bulldozers.

The earth seemed to quiet as she made everything hover about fifty feet in the air, right above the treeline.

And when the Goblins were right in front of her, Max let out a loud, vicious war cry, hurled her hands in front of her into an almost-clap.

The Flock watched wide-eyed—and a couple of humans who were on the road stopped, one of them conveniently a news van—as their leader made one square mile of construction equipment crash into the Goblins and clones, then squish them like pesky cockroaches.

Breathing heavily, Max turned around and looked at her flock.

When they just stared at her like gasping fish, she frowned and said, "What are you looking at?"

At last Gazzy said, "Holy sh—!"

"Language!" Angel and Nudge yelled, while Fang sneaked over to Max and whispered as best he could over the wind, "That was hot."

Max turned beat red and the yelled at them to keep flying.

~.~.~

We had been running through the swamp for a while when we caught up to a parked van.

We were about to go busting into it when I saw a girl whoosh out of it.

She had long flowing black hair, with bangs that covered her dark gray eyes—she almost seemed blind to some extent.

She was wearing a blue halter dress that dropped to her knees and flowed around her legs. She was that weird shade of skin that people with olive skin get when they aren't exposed to the sun.

She had wiry, well-toned muscles, a pouty mouth set into a frown.

But here's the good part, she had dark, almost black wings jutting out from her shoulder blades.

She whipped around to look at us, and then went sprinting into the arms of Iggy.

I frowned at the couple when he grabbed her and spun her around in a circle, peppering her face with kisses while she rasped out a rough, "I-I-Ig-Iggy."

I could have smiled if it weren't for the fact that this meant the end of the adventure with the blind bird boy.

I hated to admit it, but it was sort of fun chasing his girl half way around the country.

I turned away, and despite the rain, gave myself a running start before launching into the air.

Looking at a happy couple wasn't going to make me any happy, because a cursory glance of the terrain told me that _Gunner wasn't there. _

So me being a pathetic little emo landed on a tree branch half a block away from the couple and stared out at the clouds blankly, my eyes burning with unshed tears.

After a while, I guess Iggy remembered that he had _indeed_ flown to his girl with a companion who was her carbon copy.

I felt a hand on my shoulder, and when I looked up, I saw my original staring down at me with a soft frown on her pretty lips.

Iggy was right next to her, an arm wound around her waist.

He almost looked sympathetic to the girl he had ridiculed and probably hated for the entire trip.

I shrugged her hand off and looked away from her, "What do you want? I don't need you to rub it in, I didn't get to Gunner."

Iggy frowned, "Look we don't need attitude. Tally just wanted to tell you what happened to Gunner."

I cocked an eyebrow, "But she's mute."

Really, that tic Iggy had in his eyebrow was starting to turn into a twitch, "She can send pictures. She told me that Gunner and her were attacked in the middle of the road by a roaming band of Goblins and Alex clones."

"Yeah, so what?"

He could've chucked something at me, I could tell. "She hid in the van, Gunner went out and start chucking balls—of light?"—Tally nodded here in confirmation, twirling her long inky hair around her finger—"And the goblins over took him. So that means that they might be taking him to a Facility."

I winced then aimed my purple eyes at Tally's, and she stared back at me with equal intensity, "You're sure of this?"

She gave me a quick jab of a nod.

"Then…we'll find Gunner?"

Tally knelt in front of me, then nodded her head yes, her gray eyes full of all the determination in the world.

I smiled, and tucked a stray lock of hair behind my ear to hide the one tear that fell down my cheek, "Alright then, we're going to save Gunner, Oh-Apocalypse Children."

* * *

**Reviews are love! I need feedback to continue the story!**


End file.
